C17 The First Closeddoor Seclusion Ended!
A heartless man may not be a true hero, but a man who cares for his son is indeed a man among men.
Old Li was concerned that Bai Chengcheng might be negatively influenced by his mother's erratic behavior, so he consistently presented himself as stern and unyielding in front of his son. Perhaps it was just his nature. Regardless, he epitomized the image of a strict father, relentlessly imparting Confucian values of benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, and loyalty to Chengcheng.
Despite Old Li's relatively low status within the family and the fact that most people nowadays would scoff at such old-fashioned ideas, parents are a child's first teachers. Their influence on Chengcheng was undeniable.
Old Li didn't meddle with Bai Yaojin's decisions, but he couldn't help feeling uneasy about letting go of his only son.
With concern in his voice, Old Li asked, "Chengcheng has always had everything handed to him. Can he truly manage on his own?"
Bai Yaojin, uncharacteristically somber, replied, "Leave Yunyun and Meimei with him."
Having two robots to accompany Bai Chengcheng was hardly out of the ordinary; many wealthy families employed robot housekeepers and personal assistants.
These children of affluence enjoyed the services of highly sophisticated robots capable of cooking to their exact preferences, managing their daily routines, and organizing their schedules. Such advanced robots came with a hefty price tag.
Yunyun, mentioned by Bai Yaojin, was the bookstore manager, Xiao Yun. Meimei was the adorable little 'Barbie doll.'
Faang Xinghang only noticed Xiao Yun's exceptional qualities, but both robots were far from ordinary. Although they were not unbranded products and had verifiable manufacturing details such as production dates, serial numbers, and quality certificates, they were indeed unbranded, crafted by hand by Bai Yaojin.
Father Bai's initial argument was clearly ineffective. Xiao Yun and Xiao Mei were more than capable of maintaining Bai Chengcheng's pampered lifestyle. So, he shifted his concern, "What if he encounters a life-threatening danger? Like the kind he faced at Tian Jian?"
Bai Yaojin sighed, "You're making a mountain out of a molehill. Fine, the decision is yours. If you don't want him to strive for more and would rather he remain a spoiled rich kid his whole life, then I'll just keep supporting him."
Elder Li hailed from a lineage steeped in poetry and scholarship. His aspiration for his son to soar like a dragon was fiercer than that of most fathers, and he was adamant that his son not become a wastrel. With a note of uncertainty, he asked, "But is it still against the rules to intervene in a life-threatening situation?"
Bai Yaojin gave Elder Li an exasperated look and retorted, "Once he turns eighteen, even verbal assistance from me is against the rules, let alone physical intervention. That's only if he doesn't compete."
Feeling defeated, Elder Li conceded, "But he's not yet eighteen."
Bai Yaojin, caught between laughter and tears, replied, "Fine. We'll make our move after his eighteenth birthday." Chengcheng's birthday, according to the Earth Calendar—also known as the Gregorian calendar—was still over five months away, conveniently after the college entrance exams.
As time swiftly passed, nearly a month had already flown by.
In the basement, Bai Chengcheng once again accessed the Pelia panel.
System name: Pelia
Host: Bai Chengcheng
A Language Level: 3 (1,212/10,000) Current course: Classical Literature (20) (Assessment score: 18)
B Mathematics Level: 3 (1,314/10,000) Current course: Fuzzy Mathematics (20) (Assessment score: 16)
C Physics Level: 3 (1,142/10,000) Current course: Electrodynamics (20) (Assessment score: 20)
D Mechanical Engineering Level: 2 (964/1,000) Current course: Metal Cutting and Manufacturing (20) (Assessment score: 20)
E Informatics Level: 3 (2,328/10,000) Current course: Thought Wave Encoding Principles (20) (Assessment score: 18)
F Life Sciences Level: 2 (332/1,000) Current course: Maxillofacial Surgery (20) (Assessment score: 14)
G Sociology Level: 2 (536/1,000) Current course: Educational Psychology (20) (Assessment score: 18)
H Military Science Level: 1 (68/100) Current course: The Art of War by Sun Tzu (20) (Assessment score: 14)
I Martial Arts Level: 4 (10,000/100,000) Current course: Dragon Overturning Claw (1,000) (Assessment score: 0)
[Mission: Develop the basic operating system for the N-ary Thought Wave (Exam Score: 1000)
Reward: Number of yoctometer robots (165.7 billion) Host's control over Thought Waves (40 billion)
Out of the robots received, only 4.7 billion were from cultural studies. A whopping 111 billion stemmed from combat training. Bai Chengcheng remained the usual cultural 'underachiever'. An additional 50 billion were earned from completing missions. All previous missions involved writing tool programs for the N-ary Thought Wave.
Indeed, the yoctometer robots processed Thought Waves, not electromagnetic waves, employing fuzzy logic. To put it simply, think of it as an analog circuit rather than a digital one. The 'N' in N-ary is a variable; the greater the N, the more precise the control. This can be likened to the intervals in calculus.
Pelia thought digital circuits were rather dim-witted, only understanding 0s and 1s, merely capable of binary choices. No matter how intelligent a binary computer became, it could only select the best option from a set of known choices. Its intelligence was directly proportional to the volume of data it had amassed. For instance, robots outplaying human chess champions did so by incorporating all existing human chess strategies. When challenged, the computer would pick the optimal move from its database. If the database lacked an appropriate countermove, the computer would be clueless, only able to select the closest approximation.
Another drawback of digital circuits was their inefficiency. The binary system resulted in a lot of redundant operations. To calculate 8 + 6 = 14, it had to convert to 1000 + 0110 = 1110, requiring at least four operations. In an N-ary system, if N equals 10, only one calculation is necessary. With complex computations or large datasets, the larger the N, the simpler and faster the operation, with efficiency many times that of binary computers.
In the same vein, the larger the N, the simpler the programming becomes. It's akin to our ancestors' script, where a single character held a wealth of meaning. With comprehensive computational tools, humans and computers could directly communicate via thought, turning human thought waves into executable computer programs.]
Bai Chengcheng prioritized information science in his cultural studies, fervently acquiring both existing and theoretical knowledge in the field. Unbeknownst to him, he had unwittingly unleashed a formidable 'demon king' by opening Pandora's box.
Binary computers lack the capacity for independent thought, merely selecting the optimal solutions from their databases. In contrast, robots with fuzzy logic in an n-ary system possess the ability to understand and eventually develop their own patterns of thought, evolving into genuine robotic life forms. Pelia herself hailed from a realm of mechanical beings, her essence that of an advanced robotic entity.
Pelia certainly had her own agenda; her thirst for vengeance demanded formidable military strength. The extent of her power hinged on the size of her yoctometer robot legion. With a sufficient number of yoctometer robots, she could amass an army of robotic soldiers, fighter jets, battleships, and space fortresses, each endowed with autonomous thought.
Pelia sternly cautioned Bai Chengcheng to keep this programming technique a secret, wary of the chaos that uncontrolled robotic life could unleash upon the world—a scenario reminiscent of her own world, which could jeopardize her chances of triumph. She was acutely aware that she was not cut out for the role of a conqueror.
Her focus was solely on revenge, not on reclaiming her homeland. Yet even revenge proved daunting; she questioned whether she could even achieve restoration, let alone stand against a vast empire.
However, Pelia had a change of heart. She now sought to mold Bai Chengcheng into a polymath, leveraging both his abilities and the world's resources to exact her revenge, hence her insistence on his extensive education.
The notion of inviting disaster into one's home was foreign to Pelia. To her, stripping her nemesis of everything they had painstakingly achieved was far more satisfying than mere annihilation. What became of the empire post-revenge was irrelevant to her. When she faced her downfall, few stood by her, while many others kicked her while she was down.
The embodiment of her enemy's despair was none other than Bai Chengcheng. Not only did he have a powerful mother, Bai Yaojin, but he also possessed immense potential. In just one month, Bai Chengcheng's martial arts skills had progressed to level three, his academic score soared to 7,796 points, and he mastered 395 books. He had completed not only all high school coursework but also the entire first-year university curriculum.
Is it possible to master 395 courses in just one month? There was certainly a special reason behind such an achievement.
To begin with, the medicinal concoction Bai Yaojin used for Bai Chengcheng's muscle and marrow cleansing was unparalleled in strength. Dragonstar aimed to enhance the nation's physical health and provided level one and level two cell-strengthening drugs to the populace at no cost. However, drugs of level three and higher were not free due to the exorbitant costs involved. The level two cell-strengthening liquid was sufficient for humans to endure the g-forces experienced during interstellar travel, which is why higher-level drugs were not subsidized.
Currently, cell-strengthening liquids are categorized into five levels, with the first two being complimentary. A single dose of level three, a mere ten milliliters, retails for a hundred thousand star dollars. Level four costs ten million per dose, and level five soars to a billion per dose. Levels four and five are so rare that they are beyond market price.
The cost of the medicinal liquid Bai Yaojin procured for Bai Chengcheng and his companions' cleansing was even more expensive than the existing level five drugs. A hundred billion star dollars couldn't buy even ten milliliters, yet she did not hesitate to provide a full medical pod. This treatment not only strengthened the physique but also unlocked potential within the brain. Any substance capable of brain development is considered an exceptionally rare treasure. Consequently, Bai Yaojin forbade Bai Chengcheng from using level one and two cell-strengthening liquids, as they were simply unnecessary.
In addition to brain development and Bai Chengcheng's own determination, the memory enhancement device (a learning system headset) played a significant role in his learning process.
Yet, none of these factors were the ultimate game-changer; that distinction belonged to Pelia. Once she resolved to nurture Bai Chengcheng, Pelia introduced a groundbreaking technique unknown to the world—Dream Learning.
Time in the dream realm flows differently from reality. Pelia enabled Bai Chengcheng's conscious mind to rest in sleep while his subconscious engaged in the dream state. All dreams were focused on learning, extending a hundredfold longer than in the external world. Eight hours of standard daily study equated to eight hundred hours of learning time. And he wasn't fatigued because his conscious mind was at rest, albeit in a light sleep. When tallied up, Bai Chengcheng's sleep amounted to the equivalent of a thousand days of study.
Eating and personal hygiene took two hours, while sleep (or study) accounted for eight hours. That left Bai Chengcheng with fourteen hours of wakefulness each Earth day, half of which he devoted to cultivation and the other half to reviewing the current high school curriculum in preparation for the college entrance exam. Pelia's reading list differed from the standard high school textbooks.
Today, Bai Chengcheng had finished programming and inputting the basic operating system for the N-base Thought Wave, finally granting him personal control over the yoctometer robots. Eager to check his progress on the panel, he was disappointed to find that his current level of psychokinesis could only manage a maximum of four billion yoctometer robots.
Four billion might sound substantial, but in reality, it was minuscule. Even if each yoctometer robot measured 30 zeptometers in diameter, when clustered into a sphere, the diameter would only be about six to seven attometers. To be precise, that's 6.5 x 10^-9 nanometers. Lined up, they would stretch a mere 1.2 x 10^12 attometers, or 1.2 nanometers—barely visible under an electron microscope.
What good were such tiny yoctometer robots? Certainly not enough to fashion into conventional weapons; a needle with the thickness of an attometer and the length of a nanometer couldn't even kill a cell, much less harm a person. Yet, they weren't entirely useless. At the very least, they could disperse and burrow into the interior of solids to detect their structure. The gaps between protons and neutrons in an atomic nucleus were at least a thousand times larger than an attometer, making these devices capable of penetrating anything like dark matter.
In the timeless pursuit of cultivation, they had lost track of the date. The trio had just woken up; Bai Chengcheng was checking the panel while Lu Youzhi and Fan Gongming loudly called for breakfast.
Suddenly, the metal door opened silently, revealing Bai Yaojin with a cheerful grin. "Since you've been quite disciplined, I'm granting you a day off. Come on out, your retreat has ended."
"Hooray, long live freedom!" they cheered, scrambling to the exit. After a month of half-hearted and somewhat coerced study, they were more than ready for liberation. Yet, just two days later, they would return—entirely of their own accord, willingly and dutifully—to resume their seclusion.
Upon reaching the second floor, Bai Chengcheng, Faang Xinghang, and Pelia skipped breakfast and made a beeline for the Second World connection pod.
They halted abruptly at the pod's entrance, as if someone had hit the pause button, frozen in place.
